It's Original....

Prem Panicker joined Yahoo India as its Managing Editor after a long innings at Rediff.com.

While joining Yahoo, he talked on his blog about changing Yahoo from being purely a news aggregation service to producing original content. In this post, he talks about coming to the sobering realization that readers don't care about the source of the content and the consequent postponement of his dream, albeit temporarily, of assembling a crack team that would produce original content. That sent out a groan of disappointment from the many who yearn for original content from India.

In the same post, he announced that he had enlisted my favorite blogger from India - Amit Varma to create the Yahoo Opinions section and enlisted some of the top bloggers in the country to contribute original content.

Last week, Prem announced the launch of the official Yahoo editorial blog - Fit to Post. The blog's contributors are members of the Yahoo India editorial staff. Prem describes how the blog benefits the contributors in his inimitable eloquent style -

"It allows my colleagues in Yahoo, who thus far have been voiceless entities spending their days and nights curating content that comes from a multiplicity of sources, to spread their wings; to write and, through writing, to move beyond their daily brief and explore their own limits."

Prem features on the blog too and here's his latest.

Over the years, many of us, living in and outside India, have been helplessly watching the decline of journalism in India across all forms of media. With some notable exceptions like Tehelka and Outlook, the coverage of events and the editorial content emanating from India is indolent and a crass distortion of the truth to make the "news" sensationalistic and simplistic. Its completely devoid of original content. That is why a collective cheer went up when Prem announced these seemingly small but effective initiatives for us to feast on quality writing from some of the top writers in the country.

At Rediff.com, while he was not responsible for the content on the portal, because people related talked about Prem and Rediff.com in the same breath, it was inevitable to associate him with the crap that passed for journalism. Frankly, the best content on Rediff.com are the comments by the readers. They constitute the Humor section of the portal. Prem seems to have found an outlet to spread his wings and pursue his dream of creating original content. Rediff's loss is Yahoo's gain. And ours.

Coercive Healthcare

Gautam Gambir was in the news with his refreshing display of conviction and guts to stand behind his statements after he got his hand slapped by the IPL for making a frank observation about the Rajastan Royals.

He and Ashish Nehra have incurred the displeasure of the Health Ministry who is upset that they went to Sri Lanka for Ayurvedic treatment. The reason for this distress is that this may spark a trend of players seeking treatment outside the country when similar excellent conditions exist within India.

Who the eff is the health minister and his babus to tell anyone how to get themselves treated? Is there now a law in place curtailing and Indian citizen's options to receive health-care to the ones existing within India? Instead of putting in place irrational mandates like these, shouldn't they be focusing on making health-care affordable and available to the millions who languish in the dreadful conditions within the country's civil and municipal hospitals? Apparently the ministry intends to make a major push for Indian medicine systems at the Commonwealth Games. Wouldn't the government be better off ensuring that there will actually be a Commonwealth Games? The organizers are months behind schedule in getting the facilities ready to host the games.

Is it me or is that there seems to be at least one report every day of blatant violation of an individuals freedom of choice in India? Between the moral police, the fundamentalist right-wing political groups and a government with misplaced priorities, doesn't it feel like India is headed towards an Orwellian society?

Pre-marital Sex is Not an Offence!!!

The Supreme Court ruled recently that pre-marital sex between two people in a live-in relationship is not an offense. This is farcical on several fronts.

Firstly, do we really need the Supreme Court to rule on the right for two people to voluntarily decide to live together and have a sexual relationship? Secondly, who gave the moral police the right to consider this to be an offense to file a complaint with the SC? Apparently their objection is that - "The actress, Khusboo's comments allegedly endorsing pre-marital sex would adversely affect the minds of young people leading to decay in moral values and country's ethos." . The complainants are a bunch of self-righteous prudes who think they have the duty to protect the society and its youth from decay.

Some of the comments by the 3-judge bench add some levity to the situation. Here, at the risk of being redundant, they make their positions clear - ""When two adult people want to live together what is the offence. Does it amount to an offence? Living together is not an offence. It cannot be an offence." . Even the guardians of the law have to resort to religious references to defend their position - "Even Lord Krishna and Radha lived together according to mythology".

But finally, they make a telling point before passing judgment by asking the complainants - "How many homes have been affected can you tell us," the Bench asked while enquiring whether the complainants had daughters. When the response was in the negative, they shot back, "Then, how are you adversely affected ?"

The SC judges doesn't need to be praised for passing such an obvious judgment. Its unfortunate that being part of a democratic system makes it necessary for them to have to attend to such frivolous complaints. But, what's even sadder is that we need the SC to validate the most basic right of two individuals to make a choice of living together without the official act of marriage.

Information Overload

Not having ever been a reporter, I will never know for sure the pressures of being one. However, after reading these two examples of journalism, I get the feeling that a reporter is under pressure to capture a sizzling headline that entices the reader and at the same time provides a taste of what follows in the article.

Here's an article in The Hindustan Times with the information-packed headline - On wedding anniversary, VVS’s Eden affair continues

This headline informs the reader in 7 words that a) VVS Laxman celebrated his anniversary, b) he has had a success playing at the Eden Gardens and c) has a hint of scandal by hinting of an affair.

I am sure that the reporter got a pat on the back from his editor for having crammed so much information into the headline. It worked. I clicked on it and was disappointed that there were no Tiger-like revelations about Laxman.

The New Mumbai?

Rahul Bose, in an elegant article wonders whether Mumbaikars turning out to watch the new SRK film is the birth of a new Mumbai. Anil Dharker in his article feels that the Sena's politics have backfired. I don't think that its a new beginning nor do I feel that the Sena will stop resorting to these provocative methods.

The SRK-Sena tiff over the last few weeks is a small sample of the larger issue that faces India - a growing sense of regional insularity. For a moment, let's discount the cynical speculation that the entire thing was staged by both parties to gain publicity to their respective causes. Let's assume that the underlying objective of creating icons of hatred within the public was what motivated the Shiv Sena.

We see this everywhere in India - whether its the Telangana issue, the strife in Assam, the MNS propaganda against North Indians in Mumbai, the meaningless "Mumbai belongs to Maharashtra" discussion or tagging anyone who speaks about peace with Pakistan of being pro-Pakistan and a traitor to the country. In all these instances, the approach is the same - take a regional issue and create a division among the masses by promising them a new identity.

We all know that this is politics at work. But why is this movement spreading across the country? Why are people ready to die for these causes? A large section of the population is swayed by the propaganda. Why is the message of insularity appealing to a large section of the population?

Every person needs to identify with some construct in a society. Leaders in the society are able to rally people around a cause to preserve or enhance this identity. Generally, a person identifies with her or her nationality. India with its vast cultural differences and an ineffective democratic system, has always been a collection of states and not a true Republic. Also, the gap between the rich and the poor has been widening. As a result, there is an increasing part of the population who are feeling left out. There is a shortage of leaders in our country to rally the people around national causes. As a result, groups like the Shiv Sena, MNS, TDP, DMK and ULFA have found it easy to rally this section of the society around a cause and give them an identity.

I believe that we are going to see more regional factions within India creating movements to isolate a "chosen" group and promise them a better future in return for shunning those who fall outside this group. This will continue till people learn that strength lies in numbers and unity. Or the occurrence of a calamitous event that impacts the entire country and reminds every citizen of his or her nationality and unifies them. Either way, its going to be an expensive lesson and much blood will be shed.

Back on the Blog...

After a long hiatus, I am back...My previous blog - Andaz Apna Apna (andazapna2.blogspot.com) is no longer available for me to add new posts. Presumably due to inactivity. Serves me right.

While this blog will cover the wide range of subjects that interest me - sports, books, films, technology and religion, my primary emphasis will be to stimulate a discussion around how fundamentalist thought is taking over the world. I hope to be able to, through actual events happening around us, expose the hypocrisy and fallacy of the proponents of fundamentalism to foster divisiveness and total lack of tolerance to alternate notions and views.

You may ask - why is this an important subject that merits discussion? Its my fervent belief that as the "world gets flatter", its inhabitants are being manipulated by politicians and religious leaders to get more insular in their beliefs and their ideals. My hope is that there are others out there who share this sentiment and that we can part of a larger dialog on the Web that helps fight this regressive phenomenon.